S6E36 - Navigating the Shift from Remote to Hybrid: Strategies for Sales Teams

What's up, everybody? Welcome to another episode of the Surf and Sales Podcast. I'm Scott Least one of the two founders and co hosts of the Surf and Sales event itself and the podcast here with my good friend and partner, Richard Harris. How's it going, big guy?

I'm good, man. How are you doing? I know you're gearing up for like a month of travel. You're going to be on an airplane, you're going to. I'm going to laugh at you for all the years you've laughed at me for all the travel I have to do.

That would be fair. That would be fair. My. In my. In my defense, I don't have to go anyplace lame like, you know, St. Louis, Missouri or Omaha, Nebraska. I mean, yeah, I have to go. Chico's maybe lame, but at least I'm. It's my home. At least. So, you know. Well, yeah, I got a lot of travel.

Say hi to Aaron Rodgers while you're up there.

Yeah, something tells me he won't be there. I don't think he's been there in quite. Quite some time, man. We are joined today by a guy who started a company called Track Rec that you might have heard of. It's kind of be getting a lot of publicity and traction. Play on words there on LinkedIn in particular. They've gone from zero, let's just say, to 14, almost 15,000 users in no time flat. And one of the killer things about it, and it's very relevant as you kind of wind down 2025 and think about your personnel needs for 2026, is all about recruiting and how to hire the right people and verified employment records. Richard, imagine you could actually verify somebody's performance before you hired them. I would have loved to have that kind of kidding.

You'd have never hired me.

I. Maybe you would have never hired me. Oh, wait, you did.

I didn't have no success.

I had no success. But we are here by the CEO and founder of Track Wreck. His name is Victor Vadis and he's coming to us from Canada. Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

Thank you.

How's it going, Victor?

Yeah, very good. Thanks so much for having me. I'm excited.

Victor, by the way, Richard is one of the most stereotypical French Canadians that there is, because he's French from France, and then he went to Montreal, French, you know, Quebec. Very cliche. Very cliche. Okay, Victor, introduce yourself real quick. Just tell people, what the heck is Track Rec? What's the context for, you know, what you're building and that Kind of stuff. And then we'll get into some of, some of the stuff about your story.

Yeah, for sure. So I founded track rec about 2 1/2 years ago and it's. The result is the product. Product result of the sales agency, sales recruiting agency I founded four years ago. And I'm all about data, I'm all about having a clear understanding of who somebody is. And I wanted to kind of help the recruiting game and elevate the recruiting game and ditch the, the bias and the sexism and the racism and the ageism and the favoritism that plagues the recruiting world. And this is why I built Track Rec in the first place. To give everybody and anybody a fair shot at getting hired. And so we're on a mission to bring transparency and, and accelerate career growth while helping companies prevent a lot of mis hires as well.

Yeah. And it's a, it's a sort of a double sided marketplace. So it's good for salespeople to get on there, upload your, you know, resume, for lack of a better phrase.

And your track record.

Performance record. Yeah, your track record. Right. And it's also good for the other side of the marketplace if you're an employer or recruiter because you are looking at people and you're saying, oh, Victor has hit his number five years in a row and this is verified whatnot. So cool stuff. Yeah. So what is the, what is the, what is the hiring scene look like in, in sales in particular for 2026? Is there a way, Is there a way?

Billion dollar question.

Is there a way to be optimistic about it or are we all just white knuckling it and scared?

From where I stand with the agency and with the visibility that Track Rec gives us, I think we're in for a great year of 2026. And I'm talking about B2B sales roles in traditional B2B industries. Because all three of us, you know, we're big on tech and big on.

SAS, but there's a lot of other B2B industries that are.

Recession proof and that will keep on hiring. We talked about healthcare, manufacturing. There's plenty of industries that are still hiring pretty intensely, intensively. And I think that's the biggest thing. We always look at things with the lens of the technology and the SAS and the AI and the agentic, all the, the headline grabbing companies.

Yeah.

But the market as a whole is, is in high tension. We've never received so many requests. Companies are really increasing their standards of hiring. The salaries have increased. From where I stand, compared to five, six years ago. But the expectations are high. There are more and more niche roles. And what I see a lot is companies looking for specialists.

What do you mean when you say that?

Well, they're looking for people who have sold to their icp, sold to their Persona, understand the market segment motion that they're in. So mid market enterprise. They need to find people that special that have a flavor to their profile. So if you've sold the IT implementation services for the past five years, your best chance to land your next gig is to stick with your industry. Switching over from one industry to another, I find based on what all of our clients are telling us is getting more and more complicated.

And is it because they. Is that because it's a buyer's market? Meaning, hey, we know there's a lot of salespeople looking for jobs right now, therefore we can be a little bit more picky. Or is it because leadership doesn't believe that sales skills are transferable and they suck at training and coaching?

I think it's a bit of both. But yes, it's true that employers have the bigger end of the stick compared to post Covid frenzy, where if you had a pulse and you could say three words, then you would lend a gig. You know, it was really it, to be honest with you. We had people out of college negotiating base salaries for BDR roles without taking a first call through email.

Yeah.

And all these guys are in for like an awakening of sorts.

Yeah.

But back to your question. Because the tension is always going to be on account exec roles. It's always going to be on new business roles. And so the premise of everybody that I talk to every day is we need them to hit the ground running as fast as they can. We need them to have not a Rolodex, but a good sense of what the market.

Represents. And we need them to bring revenue as soon as possible.

And are they able to find them?

Are they or how are they.

Are they able to find them? Because I always feel like it's also.

Back to them increasing salaries. I've seen that a lot. I've seen base for enterprise account Execs go from 150, which was usually the norm, to now 200 for the ones that really tick the boxes they're trying to take. So yes, they are because they're willing to. To spend more, maybe hire less, but spend more on the ones that really fit their description.

Got it. What kind of role? Because I don't live in this world, you know, and I love what you said that, you know, there's a lot of roles outside of SaaS, right? Which is where Scott and I spend 99 of our time. What, what does a role in manufacturing look like? What, like what am I, what am I selling? Like when I hear that, like this.

Super cool stuff to guys that have a lot of money and the market is huge. There's agriculture, there's forestry products, industries that, you know, if you're not doing that then you're doing purely sas, then you know you've never heard about them. I'm in a sort of a privileged position where we, we're pretty agnostic in terms of if you're hiring a salesperson, B2B, we're going to talk to you and you know, you get to learn industries that they don't make any waves, they're not in the headlines, they don't have an article in TechCrunch and things like that, but they're printing money. They're hiring solid reps that will make more money than the SaaS. Guys with OTE that are not inflated, that they already have a track record for in a market that is constantly growing.

And are those, are there reps out there like that? Like, are there reps out there that are selling that manufacturing farm equipment that are looking for jobs or do they already have jobs? Like I'm, I'm trying to find that balance between, hey, they want this level of experience and they can choose it versus those who probably listen to us, who might be more SaaS and tech oriented thinking, well, can I even try to go after those jobs even though I don't have that experience? Like, should they?

You know what's funny with the tech world and the SAS world is that it's the, the number one world where companies are going to be like, if you don't have SaaS experience, I don't want to talk to you.

Yeah, dumbest thing ever.

It is dumb, but we've felt that for years and it's interesting to hear you say that it's about to become stronger. My question is the opposite and I don't know the answer to this because I've never gone that direction. Let's say we started off the show by talking about these other industries, Victoria, that are recession proof or still going strong or whatever. Right? Let's say you've got tons of SaaS experience in sales, but you want to leave tech. Maybe you're fed up with it, you're tired of hearing about AI or whatever. You want to go to medical or insurance or oil and gas or whatever the heck industry from, from your seat. Are those industries having a similar approach of like, oh, you don't have oil and gas experience, you come from the tech world, we won't hire you. Or is it, I guess, is it bi directional, that bi way less, way less bias. So easier for them to hire a tech person than for a non tech person to get hired in tech A hundred percent.

And we see, we see a few things. We see candidates that have five years in sas, which for some is considered the holy grail, saying I'm out, I'm going to go sell something more tangible, different. I'm going to manage a territory and I'm going to go shake hands and I'm, I'm not going to run zoom calls every day because I'm going crazy. And then we see clients tell us, let's have a client. They sell bed frames and they're like, you know, find me people that are super hungry. 3 years B2B quota carrying can manage a territory. And when they talk to SAS people, it doesn't resonate because it's just not the same approach. When you've managed Minnesota and North Dakota and Iowa and you and when you were sitting in Boston in an office running 20 demos per week, it's just not the same approach. And so the, these types of recession proof industries and whatnot, they sometimes they look at the SaaS people and it's not even that attractive to them.

That's interesting.

Yeah, but they don't.

Same argument from the other side.

Sorry Rich.

No, it's the same, it's the same argument from the other side that they want someone with outside sales experience. Maybe not bed frame selling experience, but they want someone who knows how to go out and meet people and greet people and all those things.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But don't get me wrong, a lot of them will still ask for, hey, I need them to have sold something very technical hardware to these types of buyers. So they'll still have very high standards and ideally they'll want someone from the industry. But the barrier of entry is not as high. It's not put on a pedestal like SAS and tech can, can be.

Yeah, it's not the end all be all. They're more humble about it potentially.

You know, probably more something to do with that.

Yeah, I would say they're, they're like the salt of the earth. Right. You know, Scott, I lived in Cleveland for a year and you know, I had, I was hiring college kids or kids just coming out of college or even Some high school graduates where their parents met on the dirt devil factory floor, both working the second shift. Right. And you know, those people just have a work ethic you just cannot teach, you know, and I think it sounds like that's a big play here too. Right. And yeah, you know, I, I want to shift the subject if I can, Scott, unless you got another question, go ahead.

Yeah, go ahead.

Okay. Let's talk about the.

The, I wouldn't even say it's, it's the Gen Z crisis that they're finally getting their slap in the face that, yeah, you got to go into an office. Yeah. You got to show up and do your job. Yeah. You're going to work, you know, 8 to 5, 9 to 5, whatever it is, versus this whole I want to live in a remote world. Is the industry finally shifting back to that? Like, it feels like it is. I see it. And then, you know, look, I, I, I, I swim in the cesspool of sales communications called Reddit. And the, the way some of these people talk is hilarious to me.

Where is that falling, where is the remote work from home, back to office stuff going these days? Right. And, and what should people know about going back to the office if they're, if it's going to be a requirement?

Yeah.

So I've had the agency for four and a half years. I launched September 2021, smack in post Covid. At the time, 90% of the roles we were asked to fill were fully remote. Now it's about 20% remote. The rest has some kind of geographic requirement. And so usually the biggest chunk of what we're seeing is two to three days in the office, two to three days at home.

So by far, the primary thing that you're seeing as a trend is the hybrid kind of model.

Hybrid 100. Yeah.

And do you think it'll stay that way?

Sorry?

Do you think it's gonna stay that way?

You think it will stay that way? Do you think it will skew more towards full back in the office? And, and a better question potentially is like, what's the, what's the response from the, from the market, from the candidate pool? What's the response? Are people accepting this yet? Or are they like, no, no, no, no, no, I don't want to do that. And maybe that's why they're still unemployed.

So there's a few things. So first, I believe that hybrid is really based, again, just not even my opinion. It's based on all the, the, the companies we talk to on a yearly basis. I believe hybrid is going to become the model of the standard for the. The future.

And so we also see the creation of hubs. And so we'll be. The companies will be like, we have a hub in Boston, we have a hub in Austin, Texas. And you can be in one of these, but you can't be anywhere else. And we'll have an office. Maybe it's not a big office of 100 people, maybe it's a hub of 15 and a hub of 10, but we need you there. And especially for the younger generation, which is the. The subsequent question that you had, it wasn't a brutal reaction. I think it took about a year for the transition for these people to understand that the world that they were brought in because they were just graduating college when they entered the job market and Covid end of COVID hit for them. It was their reality. That was all they knew. Right. That was just, this is how work is done. And from where I stand, it took about a year for these guys to realize, oh, snap, I don't really have the amount of leverage I thought I had initially. And so they swallowed the pill and they accepted it. And now I see actually something else. Literally yesterday I was talking to a stellar candidate and she's like, oh, man, it's only two people in the office. Because I really want to find that sort of.

They want. She wanted to find the team and the camaraderie. Yeah.

Especially in sales. You know, she's like, who am I going to make blitzes with? Who am I going to do like three hour call blocks with?

Right.

And so she's like, I'm not going to pursue because I want a bigger team, I want an office. I want that life, especially, you know, you're young, you're single, how are you going to meet people you're going to.

Or you're extroverted. I think extroverted people need that. Right. I think, I think it also feels like that companies are realizing that if they're going to have this level of like, return to office, they've got to, particularly for the. For the young people. Because I agree with you, there's a lot of learning that happens there and that camaraderie and those things. Right. That's the stuff I miss. Right. But I also think they have to be organized about what they're doing. If they're just making people come to the office to do zoom calls because they just want them in an office where they could do that zoom call at home, that's silly. I think the companies are going to have to get smarter about building out the action, particularly in the sales world. I got another question. And then I know we actually, you know, God, for getting on time. Overemployed, Right. Scott, do you even know what this term is?

Overemployed. That means. That means I have multiple jobs.

Yes.

The bubble differs multiple W2 jobs, right? Yeah. Yeah. So.

Do you like it? Do you not like it? I mean, you know, as someone who's placing people, I'm sure you don't like it. For that perspective, like, where the did.

This come from about that?

Oh, tell us. I always like a horror story. Even though Halloween's over.

Give us a good horror story.

Scott would have been overemployed though, if he could have gotten away with it.

Twice.

You might be now actually twice this year.

It happened that unfortunately, through my agency, we placed two different candidates and they never quit their initial job.

Right.

And so they double dipped for one guy was able to make it work for four months. The other one, they caught him after six weeks. And I confronted both of them.

Yeah.

One of them came clean and he's like, yeah, you know, I kind of tried and it didn't work. The other guy, a little sketchier. And this is what scares companies today the most. You know, back in 2021, it was like, yeah, guys work from home. It's the best. Don't worry, things are going smoothly today with the whole back to the office and whatnot. When you're remote, I think you have a bigger target on your back in terms of the reporting, the, the commitment, the you owning your own business, especially in sales. The senior ones, you know, they don't really want to tell you what they're doing all day. But you, you're, you know, you're in New York, they're in Austin. You need to have some sort of understanding of what's happening more than just what's sitting in the CRM.

Yeah.

And so I even had a guy this year, he, I reach out to him and he's like, oh yeah, that would be interesting. That would be my third W2. I'm like, what's happening, buddy?

You think, how much do you think is, you know, and I get it. Look, look, I look, I have, I love the idea of making more money, right. If I can carry two salaries. How much of it though do you think is being driven by the fact that, you know, unfortunately, like Gen Z, it's gonna be hard for them to buy houses, it's hard for them to do some of these life Things that they want to accomplish, Right? Or do you think it's really driven by it? The man. Hate the man. I want to take as much money as I can, and I want to go live my Instagram life.

I don't know. I don't think I can answer this one honestly. All I can think of is, as a salesperson, you're not a nine to five type of person. You know, you wake up, you're a salesperson, you sell, you go to sleep, and then you rinse and repeat. So to me, as an account exec, as an ic, I'm supposed to throw everything I have in my own success. Right?

Right.

And I don't think I can chase two different rabbits at the same time.

Scott, for those who aren't watching the YouTube version, Scott, you. You kind of had this look on your face of when I asked this question. What do you think's doing it? Is it. Is it that they're. They're being like the man? Or is it like, no, I need to build a life for myself?

I.

They are not calmly saying, I need to build a life for myself.

I'm. That's why I'm asking the question. I want people to listen.

That is the most wholesome sounding Little House on the Prairie answer I could ever think of.

I'm impressed you even know Little House on the Prairie.

Come on, dude, that's. That's some, like, small town Georgia that you grew up with. They're not doing that. Look, this is why they're doing it. They're trying to get over on people. That's what they're trying to do. They know that they could be fired at any moment. They've seen a million layoffs over Covid and the tech downturn and all this kind of stuff. They've been mistreated multiple times before, potentially. So they're jaded and they're thinking, okay. Some of them, I think, are thinking, I'm pretty good at my job. I can hit my quota by working half a day. So if I had a second job that I work the other half of the day at, and I could double dip and get over on everybody. I'm not hurting anybody. If I can perform like that. I deserve that money. I'm down to do it.

If.

Plus, it's a huge if. It is a huge if, but that's what they're thinking. And then the other part, the other people. The other people don't care. They don't care. They're like, I pulled that off for four months. I double Dipped for four months. I'm good. No worries.

I don't care if I still have a job.

They still have one.

If they lose one, they still have one.

Right, Right.

So.

So what difference does it make? Unfortunately, that's what they're thinking. They're just trying to get over on people. They're running a hustle, they're running a scam. And, you know, they're not thinking about. Yes, they're. They're not thinking about the long term damage that that could do.

Yeah, what is the long term damage?

Oh, listen, if I. If I find out that. That Victor has a history of, you know, trying to work multiple double twos, W2s and whatnot, I'm not hiring him. And I'm telling you not to hire him.

And you're telling your friends.

I'm telling everybody. Like, so every single time that somebody tries to back channel Victor, I'm like, nope, don't do that. Don't do that. And eventually you run out of options, man, because, you know, it's a big little world out there. Like, news travel is fast, you know. Oh, I don't believe that. I don't believe this wholesome sort of answer of, I'm just trying to struggle and trying to make a life for myself.

I'm asking the question, so. But Scott, would you have done it in your 20s? There's a big grin on his face. Everybody.

I don't. That's difficult to answer because back then I think it would be impossible. So I was not. I don't. It wasn't remote, number one. There was none of these tools and technology that like, you know, enables you to perform better, faster or anything like that. Like, I was dialing a phone and holding the phone in my neck, in the crank in my neck. Like, I don't know. Do. Can I understand the attraction to it? Absolutely. I could understand the attraction to it, but I don't. I think I heard Victor sort of say, yeah, but most of them can't do it. I don't think I would have been any good. I don't think I could have split my focus back then trying to sell two products.

I'm calling on you because you did it.

No, you had.

Yeah, no, I had your W2 and then you started your consulting business.

A 1099 is different.

Yeah, but that. That's different. That's different, though. That's different. That's my own side business. I'm not, I'm not. Nobody's paying me to do anything. It's how much I want to do and how much I want to spend. And by the way, I appreciate you bringing that up. That was like 12 years into my career already. It's not like I was, you know, early stage individual contributor or whatever. Right.

Scott, we need to have a one on one conversation about this and record it. It's, it's the conversation. People love to hear about us bickering at each other.

But you know, one thing funny about doing it today and you were saying, Scott, I had to be in an office today. The one way you officialize your new role is you change your LinkedIn, right?

That's right.

Then I asked the client, I'm like, but did the guy change his LinkedIn profile? And he said no. I said, well, why didn't you press on, press him on the, on the topic? Because it's like, well, just claim it to the world. You're going to be, reach out, reaching out to so many people. And they're like, no. He was always coming up with some sort of excuses as to why he wasn't changing his updating his new role. I'm like, well, that's the one way you keep someone accountable.

Obvious red, obvious red flag right there that employers should be aware of. Well, we appreciate you. I know. We appreciate you spending time with us. Victor, we're a little bit short on time today. Love the sort of state of the union you know about recruiting and where it's headed with roles and in office and remote and love what you're building at track rec. I'm a big fan and supporter of you and the company. We end every show by saying, how can we be helpful to you? Do you have any questions for us? Is there any burning question that you have you want to ask Richard or I?

Well, burning questions for me because you guys are sales pros and you keep an ear on the market. I'm really behind on the whole agentic AI and the tools and the prospecting and the new ways of operating the playbook. So anything you guys have on that front that would be very useful for me.

You want to take that, Richard?

Oh yeah. This is my new favorite topic. Right. We've seen people over index on AI, right all this year. And those who over indexed are realizing they still need bodies. Those who haven't been paying attention are thinking they're going to over index next year. And what I've come to realize in the last two weeks is that if you think about most of the layoffs that are happening, sales is still insulated like it always has been. The roles that are being replaced by AI are less people facing roles. Right. Which. And their number or coding roles, where you're. What you're looking at the most is your screen. So it's accountants in the finance department, it is the developers. It is all those individual roles. It's basic customer service at the call center, when you call Comcast or you're at your, your, your, those places. Right. It's not quite the sales role yet. And I said this the other day.

You know, someone came to me and they said, hey, Richard, you know, what's your argument when the CFO says, we are going to raise your goal, literally going to raise your goal by 50%, we expect you to do more with less in sales by using AI. And I said, good, go to the CFO and go, great. You know what? AI can do a lot of manual tasks like data entry and capturing some information, but they can't handle conversations. Just out of curiosity, because you have 16 accountants on your team, how many of them are getting replaced by AI because they don't ever have to talk to someone? And he said, you think I could say that to my cfo? I said, well, here's my cell phone number. I'll say it for you. Like, you know, like. But that's, that's where I see it. I. And I don't think people are going to change. Like, everybody in sales always over indexes on the new technology. Right. We saw it with outreach and sales Loft. Oh, I thought I could do it with less people, sort of, but not really. Right. I think that's happening now. I think sales is going to get replaced. Right. I think Scott's told me years ago, like, we've been conditioned for Amazon. Like, I can go buy thousands of dollars, hundreds of thousands of dollars without ever talking to somebody about something. Right. And I'm being conditioned for that through online shopping. But the more departments that have to make an approval because everybody's afraid to make a decision by themselves, the more influence involved in the decision making. That's going to make it harder to get rid of salespeople. The single place. If I were selling to developers, if I sold SEO services, website building stuff or tech stuff, I would build the biggest agentic AI salesperson I can because those people hate salespeople. Give a CTO an agentic person to go, but do the run their sales cycle, they will be thrilled. Right. But. So that's my rant.

Yeah. And there, and there are some of those tools out there.

Yeah, yeah, they're happening.

I don't want to give people free plugs and sponsorship opportunities, but there are plenty of them out there for you to explore. Here's the thing is you should decide what is your goal with any of these two tools? I mean, what is the goal? Is it just to close as much business as possible? Is it to send as many messages as possible? Is it to free your time up to do something else? It's not like you have to.

Turn over your whole go to market strategy to some AI agents or multiple AI agents. You don't have to do that. You know, and if I know about your business, right now your business is growing virally, word of mouth, it's growing through socials, it's growing through referrals. Right? You're creating a demand gen kind of function.

Do you need to do something else and different right now? I don't know. Based on your growth goals and all that kind of kind of thing, do you need to have 10 AI agents out there making AI SDR cold calls for your business right now? I don't think for your business you need to do that. Do you need a bunch of AI agents sending automated emails and auto commenting all over LinkedIn and stuff like that? I don't think that would do good. I don't think that would be beneficial for your reputation and the reputation of your platform, which is all about trusted verification, humanity, you know what I'm, you know, so there's an element of like humanness in everything that you're doing that feels contrary, contrary to all the agentic AI kind of stuff. So I think just pause and figure out what is actually your goal. Don't just hear about a thing to Richard's point and then chase after the thing just because, you know, hear about a thing and then say, what do I actually want to do with that? Right, yeah, for sure.

And it's tying back to what Richard was saying about being authentic, genuine and people craving people interaction. It's just something we're always going to need and it's not getting replaced by those fake comments that people post on LinkedIn.

Right, right, right on, man. Well, we appreciate you spending some time with us, Victor. He is the CEO and founder of Track Rec and we have been the surf and sales podcast and we look forward to talking to you again soon. Take care everybody.

Thanks guys.

See you.

Bye.